Sherwin-Williams Company v. Perry Company

424 S.W.2d 940, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2638
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedFebruary 21, 1968
Docket11564
StatusPublished
Cited by19 cases

This text of 424 S.W.2d 940 (Sherwin-Williams Company v. Perry Company) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Sherwin-Williams Company v. Perry Company, 424 S.W.2d 940, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2638 (Tex. Ct. App. 1968).

Opinion

PHILLIPS, Chief Justice.

The Perry Company, Appellee here, is in the manufacturing business wherein it makes diving boards, plastic furniture, water skis, shopwork and millwork. It also has income from investments that have been placed within its corporate structure. Its principal field, however, is the manufacture of diving boards which constitutes 65% of its entire business and it is the second largest diving board manufacturer in the United States.

The Appellant here is the Sherwin-Wil-liams Company which furnished Appellee paint for its diving boards and, allegedly, some bad advice in the use thereof. The suit was for damages for loss caused from defective diving boards and the resulting loss of goodwill. Based upon jury answers to special issues, the court entered judgment against Appellant for $183,607.27.

We reverse the judgment of the trial court and remand the cause for trial consistent with this opinion.

A summary of Appellee’s case is as follows: In 1964 it produced 9,538 diving boards. In finishing these boards, Appel-lee used a polyester coating with sand sprinkled in the second coat on the topside for a non-slip tread. 382 of these boards *942 were returned under customer warranties for various defects mostly relating to finish failures resulting in a 4.01% return rate. That with its production procedure standardized, if Appellee had used the polyester finish again for its 1965 diving boards, approximately a 4% return rate could have been expected.

Hoping to reduce the 4% return rate, Appellee informed Appellant’s salesman of its desire to find a better finish for diving board purposes than polyester. In November of 1963, the salesman sought a recommendation from Appellant’s laboratory with respect thereto. Two months later the laboratory recommended to the salesman that Appellant’s diving boards be finished with a pre-paint application of a product called Homoclad and two coats of Appellant’s Super Kem Var M paint. This latter product originated as a furniture finish, which had little, if any, exterior use. This laboratory report (which was never shown to Appellee) and which makes no reference to application of plaintiff’s customary sand tread states, “The system is looking very good, however, we certainly are not ready to make any claims for the exterior durability of this system.”

Despite this caution and with full authority allegedly admitted by Appellant to act for it, the salesman went to Appellee’s plant three days later and recommended M paint with Homoclad as a better diving board finish than polyester. When the salesman applied text-applied M paint, there was a “bubbling effect” that left “pinholes” upon drying, which were readily apparent to the eye.

The cause of the difficulty with the diving boards was that moisture permeated the wood.

Following further laboratory work on this solvent problem, the salesman returned to Appellee in September of 1964, and, knowing that Appellee intended to use a competitor’s pre-paint application called Woodyouth instead of Homoclad, stated in substance to Appellee that M paint applied as directed by him would be suitable for finishing its 1965 diving boards and would do a better job than polyester.

In answer to express warranty special issues, 1 the jury confirmed the foregoing, *943 finding that in September of 1964, Appel-lee agreed with the salesman to buy and use M paint to finish its 1965 diving boards; that in September of 1964, the salesman knew Appellee intended to use a competitor’s Woodyouth and not Appellant’s Homo-clad with M paint in finishing its 1965 diving boards; that with such knowledge the salesman warranted to Appellee that M paint, applied as directed by him, would be suitable for such purpose, and that use thereof was a proximate cause of damage to Appellee.

In the course of obtaining Appellee’s agreement in September of 1964 to buy and use M paint to finish its 1965 diving boards, the salesman undertook at the time to inform Appellee how M paint should be applied to its diving boards. That he did inform Appellee with respect thereto is uncontroverted in the evidence, but what he informed them with respect thereto is sharply disputed.

Appellant contends that this suit began as a conventional product liability sujt charging Super Kem Var M as being defective, however, that this charge was withdrawn, the evidence regarding any defect in the paint being so slight that no special issue was given or requested.

Appellant further contends that being wholly unable to establish any defect in the paint itself, Appellee then charged that the reason the finish failed was that the manner in which the paint was applied with Woodyouth and Cabosil, or the use of the paint with those materials, was the cause of the defective finish. That since Appellant did not recommend the use of Woodyouth or Cabosil, the effect of the charge was that Appellant should have warned Appellee against using the combination, although it was charged, and the jury found, that the Appellant’s salesman had been negligent in showing Appellee’s employees how to apply the three materials to the diving boards. With respect to the negligence issues 2 Appellant contends that *944 it was not shown that the salesman had any duty to give such directions to Appellee, or that he did give any such directions.

Furthermore, Mr. Maurice W. Cole, the president of Appellee Company was an acknowledged expert in the use of wood, and by his own admission was a pioneer in certain phases of the painting of wood.

Appellant’s salesman, on the other hand, had never painted or assisted in painting a diving hoard. It was admitted that after a considerable amount of laboratory testing, Appellant recommended a sealer coat of Homoclad and two coats of Super Kem Var M, and that the salesman passed this recommendation to Mr. Cole. Appellant further contends that, admittedly, the salesman did not recommend Woodyouth or Cabosil, both of which were then being used by Appellee.

That Mr. Cole admitted test quantities of Homoclad and Super Kem Var M were sent to Appellee, that one test that could easily have been made was to paint a board or panel in accordance with the laboratory recommendation, put it outside in the sun, that there is no laboratory test as good as a field test. That Mr. Cole further testified that in determining whether or not a particular finish will keep out moisture, “experience is the only answer.”

Appellant further contends that no contract was made or claimed whereby Appel-lee was forced to buy and Appellant was forced to sell the paint in question. That, on the contrary, each purchase was a separate transaction, and upon receipt of each order Appellant sent Appellee an acknowledgment upon which was prominently displayed a disclaimer of warranty.

*945 That Appellee used Super Kem Var M in combination with Woodyouth and Cabosil from November 1964 to June 1965 and it had a large number of diving boards or tags from boards returned during that period.

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Bluebook (online)
424 S.W.2d 940, 1968 Tex. App. LEXIS 2638, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/sherwin-williams-company-v-perry-company-texapp-1968.